Many children grow up watching professional wrestling and admire the high-flying hard-hitting performance art, interspersed with ‘don’t try this at home’ precautionary messages.
Often the message is taken with a pinch of salt as siblings up and down the country grapple on mum and dad’s bed trying to emulate their heroes.
But what of the people who take it further and see a job opportunity in the life of tights, choke slams and ‘hard core table matches’? And does turning a childhood dream into adult reality live up to expectations?
Manchester’s HXC Wrestling Promotion is home to some of the wrestling world’s rising stars. Performing in small shows like this can carve a name for yourself, leading you to be scouted out by larger organizations in the UK or even America.
MM went back stage with the stars, hanging out with them in their locker rooms before and after the shows, seeing them in training and learning what life is like in the quest to be a wrestling superstar….
HXC’s grapplers may come in all shapes and sizes, but there are two things they all have in common: the first is their childhood love of the business – they were drawn in by the glitz and glamour of the larger-than-life personalities they idolised.
The second is their persistent strive to put on the most daring show they can for the fans who pay to see something out of the ordinary.
“Everything we do hurts,” explains hardcore specialist Jimmy Havoc.
“At the time, though, there’s just so much adrenaline running through you.
“It hurts a lot more the morning after. That first shower can be hell.”
HERE COMES THE PAIN: Havoc prepares for a slam as barbed wire awaits
Havoc cuts a remarkably relaxed figure for someone who knows what lies ahead of him that night. He’s only minutes away from taking to the ring for HXC Wrestling’s Lost Circus show.
Despite the adrenaline pumping, he’s chatty and casually sat down, sorting out his boots. He clearly takes a lot of pride in what he does for the name of entertainment.
“I don’t think I have a higher pain threshold at all – the adrenaline just means you don’t feel it as much at the time.
“My mum used to come [to shows] quite a lot until the first time she saw me get choke-slammed through light tubes,” he says with the smile of a footballer asked about his favourite goal.
“Then she couldn’t take it anymore. She does worry, but I suppose that’s understandable.”
Havoc is a gold mine of stories about his time on the circuit, from the time he had his feet set on fire using a can of deodorant – “that was a bad idea” – to pulling drawing pins out of his head after a show. It is hard to believe that he has been doing this optionally for ten years.
For Havoc, however, wrestling is not his full-time occupation – he is currently studying for a film studies degree.
BATTERED AND BLOODY: Jon Ryan vs Jimmy Havoc
And he’s not the only one. For many in this game, wrestling completely opposes what they do in the ‘real world’.
The 26-stone man mountain Alex Warmsley is a city banker by day, but moonlights as brutal behemoth Cyanide at HXC shows.
High-flyer Super Stylin’ Sam Bailey admits that it is the fact that wrestling differs so much from his day job as a waiter in Chorlton that appeals to him.
“I can get away with a lot more here,” jokes Bailey, understanding in which one of his professions he is allowed to throw people through tables.
Twinning his athletic abilities – “a lot of people tell me to slow down, but I won’t” – with an infectious natural charisma, Bailey, a born-and-bred Mancunian, says that the danger aspect of wrestling works in his favour.
“When I tell people what I do, I like to pretend I’m like James Bond,” he says with a grin.
“I say ‘it is very dangerous, but I don’t get hurt – I’m very good at it’.”
Community Support Officer Damon Leigh admits that he also knows to keep his two lives separate – he has never body slammed any criminals, despite the peer pressure of his colleagues.
“It [wrestling] just forms a part of the office banter,” he tells. “They come to a few of my shows and they enjoy watching it.
“Of course, there’s a bit of mick-taking but it all makes you a stronger team.”
At 6’2”, Leigh certainly looks the part, and he’s proven throughout a career that has seen him wrestle Europe-wide, that he is not afraid to get stuck in.
“I don’t mind getting my hands dirty,” the Urmston dad-of-one says candidly.
“I’m quite a physical person. I’ve been knocked out two or three times during my time, and I’ve come round and then finished the match.
“It’s all part and parcel.”
These men certainly have come a long way since their days of ‘trying this at home’. Now getting knocked out and having body parts set alight are ‘part and parcel’ of a job well done.
Is it living the dream? Find out more in MM’s Part Two expose on life as a Manchester hardcore wrestler.
HXC and its stars are bringing their hardcore show back to the Manchester Metropolitan Student’sUnionon November 30. Tickets available soon. For more information, visit www.hxcwrestling.com
Pictures courtesy of Ed Webster, with thanks.
For more on this story and many others, follow Mancunian Matters on Twitter and Facebook.
